The Los Angeles City Council’s Budget and Finance Committee recommended Monday that the city look into providing city employees who are new parents with four weeks of paid leave to bond with their children.

MyNewsLA.com reported employee representatives and city workers told the panel Monday that some workers face resistance from supervisors when trying to use sick leave to get compensated for parental bonding time. Newer employees, meanwhile, may not have enough paid sick leave accrued to cover parental leave.

Councilman Paul Krekorian, who chairs the committee, said Monday that Los Angeles “should catch up with the rest of the world,” referring to many industrialized nations including France, Germany and China that provide some form of paid parental leave.

Krekorian added that Wal-Mart, Ernst & Young, Bank of America and several tech companies have paid parental leave policies. “These are companies that we’re … competing against for the best and the brightest potential employees that we want to bring into city employment.”